Around June 4, 2011, the usual gaggle of antievolutionists held a closed invitation-only meeting in a rented space at Cornell University. The putative topic of discussion was "Biological Information". After the conference, they set about getting their "conference papers" published by a scientific publisher. In various places around the web, little bits of discussion turned up describing how detractors and critics had been kept out, that the unadulterated antievolution objections would be published by a major publisher not yet to be named, and that all that was needed for this plan to come to fruition was to keep the publisher's name quiet until the volume was printed.

Last week, the major scientific publisher was revealed to be Springer Verlag. Springer automatically generates pre-publication announcements for forthcoming books, so in the course of time going on, the book description popped up on Springer's web site and on Amazon.com. The cat was out of the bag.

Nick Matzke posted on Panda's Thumb that Springer had managed to get suckered by a batch of creationists. Within 24 hours, the Springer page for the book was taken down. In news reports, Springer said that the editorial staff was sending the material out for further review.

On the Discovery Institute blog, a knee-jerk post complaining about "censorship!" went up momentarily, was crawled by the Google bot, and then was taken down. Somebody on the religious antievolution side of the fence figured out, belatedly, that the best shot at getting pretty much what they thought they had in the bag would be aided by not stirring up controversy themselves. And the word appears to be going out to the faithful that it should be so. The various places where gloating comments about the conference and subsequent publication suddenly had the comments or posts deleted. Anything that can provide a record of the intentional subterfuge and misleading material provided to Springer is being expunged even now.

So this thread is open to archive and preserve that record as best we can manage, scraping sources from Google cache to Internet Archive. Please post any finds you make here.

Over on TheologyWeb, "Jorge" had posted a bit of information about conference. He had requested that the moderators delete his thread, which they did. Then "Tiggy" posted a copy of "Jorge"'s post. "Jorge" has requested that that be taken down. I'll post it here, just in case TheologyWeb is inclined to remove it.

Quote

You last visited: Today at 09:18 AMAll times are GMT -4. The time now is 09:18 AM. Forum Science Building Natural Science 301Springer gets suckered by creationist pseudoscience

Jorge recently started a thread, then for some reason demanded that it be deleted:

Jump to Post Originally posted by Jorge

Quote

1. I had promised you that the two papers that I co-authored would soon be published, remember?

Well, publication has occurred and release is supposed to be very soon - within days. However ...

2. ... we may be witnessing in real time another episode of 'EXPELLED'.

3. The Proceedings from the symposium, contained in a book titled Biological Information: New Perspectives,is now encountering the usual attempts at censorship practiced by the 'Thought Police' -- you know, thetype of censorship that the Evo-Faithful loudly deny happens at all.

4. This was strictly a scientific symposium -- I know, I was there from start to finish.Every paper was scrutinized to be/remain science ... pure science.

5. The publisher is Springer-Verlag. I assure you, the papers were heavily peer-reviewed.But guess what? They now want to do additional peer-review because of "complaints". OMG !

6. The Evo-Faithful complain that intelligent design isn't science "because it's not peer-reviewed." When it is peer-reviewed, they say, "It shouldn't have been peer-reviewed because it's not science."

Now where did I put my shotgun?

7. In passing, do you see why I use the term "dishonest" as often as I do? Do you? Huh? Do you? It fits!

Turns out the DI and Jorge are attempting to cover up the latest bit of Creationist dishonesty.

The IDCers submitted this batch of "papers" from Jorge's recent Intelligent Design Creation conference to Springer in book form called Biological Information: New Perspectives. Apparently the work was deliberately misrepresented as being from a conference sponsored by Cornell, not merely held on the Cornell campus in publicly available rental space.

The book was mistakenly tentatively accepted by some junior editors at Springer based on the Cornell name. When the truth of the matter became clear, Springer pulled the advance notice of the book.

As reported by Allan MacNeill at Panda's thumb:

Quote

From the very few bits of information I have been able to gather, the “symposium” was apparently held in the Statler Auditorium in the School of Hotel Administration at the Ithaca campus. Unlike most of the large lecture halls at Cornell, the Statler Auditorium can be rented by outside groups for non-university functions. I know this because I have performed there with the Ithaca Ballet, which used to rent the hall for their local performances. Ergo, it appears that John Sanford and the symposium organizers rented the hall and are now claiming that the event was somehow “a Cornell event” rather than an event held in a rented hall at Cornell.

Statler Auditorium has almost 900 seats, but in looking at the housing reservation at one of the links above, there were apparently only 42 attendees (and that may also include the presenters), so the auditorium would have looked a little…well, shall we say “sparse”?

link

Lots more info at

Springer gets suckered by creationist pseudoscience

Update on Springer “Biological Information: New Perspectives” Volume

and here

Quote

Score one for science this week. Evolutionary biologists were horrified by the news that a scholarly press was going to publish a work in favor of intelligent design. But a spokesman for the publishing house confirmed to Inside Higher Ed Wednesday that the book’s publication is on hold as it is subjected to further peer review.

Earlier this week, the Panda’s Thumb, a blog about evolutionary theory, posted an item about a forthcoming book from Springer called Biological Information: New Perspectives. The blog-poster and other commenters said the book was a compilation of articles by creationists and intelligent-design proponents and Springer had no business publishing such "creationist pseudoscience."

Eric Merkel-Sobotta, executive vice president of corporate communications at Springer in Germany, said in an e-mail, that the initial proposal for the book was peer-reviewed by two independent reviewers. “However, once the complete manuscript had been submitted, the series editors became aware that additional peer review would be necessary,” Merkel-Sobotta said. “This is currently underway, and the automatically generated pre-announcement for the book on Springer has been removed until the peer-reviewers have made their final decision.”

full story

Looks like the DI has gone into full damage control / spin mode.

My guess is that Cornell found out about how its name was being misused and threatened to sue the pants off the DI and the folks who dishonestly misued the connection. All across the web Creationist sites like this one are now erasing all mention of Cornell and issuing disclaimers for CYA purposes.

Too funny!

- T

As someone who has publicly commented on this issue, I find "Jorge"'s "shotgun" comment above to be a palpable threat. I consider this "fair use" of his commentary.

The following Bio-Info conference was an inspiring example of truly critical, logikos thinking in the scientific community. The symposium was not sponsored by Cornell, though Dr. John Sanford, Cornell geneticist and inventor of the Gene Gun was a principle coordinator.

(Sanford is the inventor of the Biolistic Gene Gun for genetic engineering, Cornell professor for 30 years, 80 scientific papers, 30 patents, and author of GENETIC ENTROPY: The Mystery of the Genome.

Thank you to all who prayed for this event, and who helped reduce my expenses.

It was a privilege being invited to attend the BI-NP Symposium at Cornell University last summer. Twenty-three scientists from around the world, representing various fields of science presented to attendees from many countries, including Korea, China, Germany, Canada, United Kingdom, Russia, and the United States. Among those attending, 50% were PhD’s, 25% were PhD candidates, and the rest were an assortment of diverse individuals - the least among them - me.

The BINPS at Cornell University was a purely scientific conference, with no public elements of religion in the presentations or discussion. However, there was a great deal of fruitful private dialogue involving philosophical, theological, and teleological implications among presenters and attendees during our free time. The coordinators’ decision to eliminate any public religious content was understandable given their sincere commitment as a group to trace only the "science" evidence to its best and most logical conclusion (IBE – Inference to the Best Explanation.

"Jorge" is a particularly strange person. If he was a contributer to this "scientific" conference, I know it was a fraud.

Jorge Fernandez is a real piece of work. Besides being a YEC, he also went in with Werner Gitt to publish yet another book on why "information" proves ToE impossible.

The funny part was on the book's cover Jorge had himself listed as a PhD. Turns out his "Doctorate" was purchased from an unaccredited on-line diploma mill.

--------------"Science is what got us to the humble place weâ€™re at, and what hard-won progress we might realize comes from science, with ID completely flaccid, religious apologetics bitching from the sidelines." - Eigenstate at UD

I sent this email to one of the senior editors at Springer on the 27th Feb:

Quote

Hi!

(I'm not sure if you're the correct person to contact about this, ifyou're not, could you pass this on to whoever is responsible).

I've just found out about your forthcoming book "Biological Information:

New Perspectives" (http://www.springer.com/engineering/computational+intelligence+and+complexity/book/978-3-642-28453-3). This has the potential to be a controversial text (as the editors areall active in pushing Intelligent Design), so I'm wondering why it'sbeing published as an engineering text, rather than biology: it wouldseem to be a better fit there.

Thanks in advance.

and got a reply from a different senior editor on the 28th:

Quote

Dear Bob,

thank you for your important mail concerning the planned book"Biological Information: New Perspectives".

The book has been acquired and reviewed by our experienced serieseditors of the book series "Intelligent Systems Reference Library"so it was a natural choice to publish it there under the umbrella ofapplied sciences. Thank you for your very valuable remark concerningIntelligent design, we will doublecheck the situation with the reviewersand the book editors and definitely will add a suitable Biology code.

Which I read as saying that they weren't previously aware of the ID link.

--------------It is fun to dip into the various threads to watch cluelessness at work in the hands of the confident exponent. - Soapy Sam (so say we all)

--------------"[...] the type of information we find in living systems is beyond the creative means of purely material processes [...] Who or what is such an ultimate source of information? [...] from a theistic perspective, such an information source would presumably have to be God."

--------------"[...] the type of information we find in living systems is beyond the creative means of purely material processes [...] Who or what is such an ultimate source of information? [...] from a theistic perspective, such an information source would presumably have to be God."

Seriously, anyone who has a clue about what is going on knows who Coppedge is and exactly why he was fired (and what's he trying to do to get the court's to allow ID related testimony in what is, essentially, a harrasement case).

Why withhold his name and then give so much information that anyone can figure it out.

You know once the conference is over, a lot of this stuff is posted on the internet.

Did anyone take video of the speakers? Anyone get copies of the powerpoint slides? Maybe even pictures of the attendees at a local hangout (or church in this case)?

Until I get some actual information, I'm not even sure that we can support the claim that this event actually occurred.

--------------Ignored by those who can't provide evidence for their claims.

Over on TheologyWeb, "Jorge" had posted a bit of information about conference. He had requested that the moderators delete his thread, which they did. Then "Tiggy" posted a copy of "Jorge"'s post. "Jorge" has requested that that be taken down. I'll post it here, just in case TheologyWeb is inclined to remove it.

Quote

You last visited: Today at 09:18 AMAll times are GMT -4. The time now is 09:18 AM. Forum Science Building Natural Science 301Springer gets suckered by creationist pseudoscience

Jorge recently started a thread, then for some reason demanded that it be deleted:

Jump to Post Originally posted by Jorge

Quote

1. I had promised you that the two papers that I co-authored would soon be published, remember?

Well, publication has occurred and release is supposed to be very soon - within days. However ...

2. ... we may be witnessing in real time another episode of 'EXPELLED'.

3. The Proceedings from the symposium, contained in a book titled Biological Information: New Perspectives,is now encountering the usual attempts at censorship practiced by the 'Thought Police' -- you know, thetype of censorship that the Evo-Faithful loudly deny happens at all.

4. This was strictly a scientific symposium -- I know, I was there from start to finish.Every paper was scrutinized to be/remain science ... pure science.

5. The publisher is Springer-Verlag. I assure you, the papers were heavily peer-reviewed.But guess what? They now want to do additional peer-review because of "complaints". OMG !

6. The Evo-Faithful complain that intelligent design isn't science "because it's not peer-reviewed." When it is peer-reviewed, they say, "It shouldn't have been peer-reviewed because it's not science."

Now where did I put my shotgun?

7. In passing, do you see why I use the term "dishonest" as often as I do? Do you? Huh? Do you? It fits!

Turns out the DI and Jorge are attempting to cover up the latest bit of Creationist dishonesty.

The IDCers submitted this batch of "papers" from Jorge's recent Intelligent Design Creation conference to Springer in book form called Biological Information: New Perspectives. Apparently the work was deliberately misrepresented as being from a conference sponsored by Cornell, not merely held on the Cornell campus in publicly available rental space.

The book was mistakenly tentatively accepted by some junior editors at Springer based on the Cornell name. When the truth of the matter became clear, Springer pulled the advance notice of the book.

As reported by Allan MacNeill at Panda's thumb:

Quote

From the very few bits of information I have been able to gather, the “symposium” was apparently held in the Statler Auditorium in the School of Hotel Administration at the Ithaca campus. Unlike most of the large lecture halls at Cornell, the Statler Auditorium can be rented by outside groups for non-university functions. I know this because I have performed there with the Ithaca Ballet, which used to rent the hall for their local performances. Ergo, it appears that John Sanford and the symposium organizers rented the hall and are now claiming that the event was somehow “a Cornell event” rather than an event held in a rented hall at Cornell.

Statler Auditorium has almost 900 seats, but in looking at the housing reservation at one of the links above, there were apparently only 42 attendees (and that may also include the presenters), so the auditorium would have looked a little…well, shall we say “sparse”?

link

Lots more info at

Springer gets suckered by creationist pseudoscience

Update on Springer “Biological Information: New Perspectives” Volume

and here

Quote

Score one for science this week. Evolutionary biologists were horrified by the news that a scholarly press was going to publish a work in favor of intelligent design. But a spokesman for the publishing house confirmed to Inside Higher Ed Wednesday that the book’s publication is on hold as it is subjected to further peer review.

Earlier this week, the Panda’s Thumb, a blog about evolutionary theory, posted an item about a forthcoming book from Springer called Biological Information: New Perspectives. The blog-poster and other commenters said the book was a compilation of articles by creationists and intelligent-design proponents and Springer had no business publishing such "creationist pseudoscience."

Eric Merkel-Sobotta, executive vice president of corporate communications at Springer in Germany, said in an e-mail, that the initial proposal for the book was peer-reviewed by two independent reviewers. “However, once the complete manuscript had been submitted, the series editors became aware that additional peer review would be necessary,” Merkel-Sobotta said. “This is currently underway, and the automatically generated pre-announcement for the book on Springer has been removed until the peer-reviewers have made their final decision.”

full story

Looks like the DI has gone into full damage control / spin mode.

My guess is that Cornell found out about how its name was being misused and threatened to sue the pants off the DI and the folks who dishonestly misued the connection. All across the web Creationist sites like this one are now erasing all mention of Cornell and issuing disclaimers for CYA purposes.

Too funny!

- T

As someone who has publicly commented on this issue, I find "Jorge"'s "shotgun" comment above to be a palpable threat. I consider this "fair use" of his commentary.

I do not know why this thread / OP is still active. I have TWICE requested the mods to remove it.

I requested that they remove my thread and they complied. In Tiggy's typical unethical style, hecircumvented the intent of the law by reposting in his own thread my OP -- an OP that had beenpreviously REMOVED by the mods.

I am hereby requesting for the THIRD TIME that the moderators of this forum remove this threador at the very least my words (Items 1-10) which have previously been deleted from this forum.

Thank you.

Jorge

(emphasis by Jorge)

Luckily the moderators denied to delete Tiggy's thread because he only cited what Jorge already disclosed.

--------------"[...] the type of information we find in living systems is beyond the creative means of purely material processes [...] Who or what is such an ultimate source of information? [...] from a theistic perspective, such an information source would presumably have to be God."

I sent this email to one of the senior editors at Springer on the 27th Feb:

Quote

Hi!

(I'm not sure if you're the correct person to contact about this, ifyou're not, could you pass this on to whoever is responsible).

I've just found out about your forthcoming book "Biological Information:

New Perspectives" (http://www.springer.com/engineering/computational+intelligence+and+complexity/book/978-3-642-28453-3). This has the potential to be a controversial text (as the editors areall active in pushing Intelligent Design), so I'm wondering why it'sbeing published as an engineering text, rather than biology: it wouldseem to be a better fit there.

Thanks in advance.

and got a reply from a different senior editor on the 28th:

Quote

Dear Bob,

thank you for your important mail concerning the planned book"Biological Information: New Perspectives".

The book has been acquired and reviewed by our experienced serieseditors of the book series "Intelligent Systems Reference Library"so it was a natural choice to publish it there under the umbrella ofapplied sciences. Thank you for your very valuable remark concerningIntelligent design, we will doublecheck the situation with the reviewersand the book editors and definitely will add a suitable Biology code.

Which I read as saying that they weren't previously aware of the ID link.

The reply I obtained was similar.

--------------"[...] the type of information we find in living systems is beyond the creative means of purely material processes [...] Who or what is such an ultimate source of information? [...] from a theistic perspective, such an information source would presumably have to be God."

The silence might indicate the intention to litigate. Could this be Dover part deux?

It's a sure bet that there's money and lawyers involved. The only real question is who's suing who.

--------------"Science is what got us to the humble place weâ€™re at, and what hard-won progress we might realize comes from science, with ID completely flaccid, religious apologetics bitching from the sidelines." - Eigenstate at UD

The silence might indicate the intention to litigate. Could this be Dover part deux?

Suing a publisher because they chose to reject something would be... interesting. I'm sure the outcome would be eagerly awaited by the Timecube guy, and green-ink-on-the-back-of-napkin MS writers everywhere. I don't think the rest of us need to be concerned.

My father-in-law was a law professor. He maintained that judges should have a third verdict option in lawsuits: "finding for the plaintiff", "finding for the defendant", and "get out of my court." This would be a good example of option 3.

--------------Math is just a language of reality. Its a waste of time to know it. - Robert Byers

There isn't any probability that the letter d is in the word "mathematics"... Â The correct answer would be "not even 0" - JoeG

The silence might indicate the intention to litigate. Could this be Dover part deux?

Suing a publisher because they chose to reject something would be... interesting. I'm sure the outcome would be eagerly awaited by the Timecube guy, and green-ink-on-the-back-of-napkin MS writers everywhere. I don't think the rest of us need to be concerned.

My father-in-law was a law professor. He maintained that judges should have a third verdict option in lawsuits: "finding for the plaintiff", "finding for the defendant", and "get out of my court." This would be a good example of option 3.

I recently saw this referred to as dismissal on the grounds of "what the fuck is wrong with you?"

Friday morning June 4, participants were on their way homes across America and in Europe from a successful conference entitled Biological Information: New Perspectives. They had come to hear leading lights in the Intelligent Design movement deliver 27 scientific presentations on a variety of subtopics under the umbrella theme of information in biology. From all appearances, everyone had a great time of fellowship, encouragement and intellectual stimulation. No protestors or critics detracted from the event—partly because it was not widely advertised, in order to protect the identity of those wanting to take part without jeopardizing their careers. The event was held at Cornell University beginning Monday night May 30 and concluding Thursday June 2.

The symposium centered around three themes: (1) Information theory and biology, (2) information and genetic theory, and (3) theoretical biology. Speakers from disciplines as diverse as thermodynamics, mathematics, linguistics, computer science, genetics, and of course biology presented their experimental findings and theories. Attempts were made to define information in robust ways, to compare and contrast cybernetic and biological information, and to describe levels of information coding in the cell. Computer models of evolution were critiqued, as were attempts to generate information by non-intelligent causes. Not every speaker was a proponent of intelligent design, but all believed it is an idea worth taking seriously.

Speakers and the audience had been instructed to steer clear of religious issues. The focus was on the science, and the content was as rigorous as that of any science symposium. While many well-known spokespersons for intelligent design led the way, there was a notable presence of young scientists with even more enthusiasm for the new design-based approaches to biology than the seniors. Their energy was palpable in breakout sessions and lunchtime conversations. Because of potential harm to careers of some participants, names of all are being withheld from this review.

Quote

One thing is clear from this symposium: design scientists have more fun. It was an upbeat event. There was no lack of argumentation and disagreement, but it was all constructive and respectful, with the energetic give-and-take producing light, not heat. The social events were delightful, too. Cornell is a beautiful campus. There’s evidence for intelligent design all over the grounds, especially in the university’s gardens and native plant collections. A river runs through the middle of the campus and pours over several cascades.

Interestingly, there was a notable absence of participants from Cornell or the Ithaca area. It appears very likely that many who might have otherwise have attended were afraid of negative professional consequences arising from being associated in any way with this event of its participants..

Take heart, though. It was like that before Soviet communism fell. The last years of the Iron Curtain were fierce; many individuals suffered persecution, and many lived in a state of fear. The Soviet bloc seemed impregnable. Then, perestroika and glasnost came as reality set in that communism wasn’t working. Within just a couple of years, thanks to pressure from Reagan and internal pressure from freedom loving unions, the Berlin wall fell. The world watched in astonishment as the Soviet Union unraveled in a precipitous and momentous collapse, and long-denied freedoms saw the light of a new day. It can happen with Darwinism—unless vigilance gives way to complacency, challenge to comfort, love for truth to fear of criticism. This is no time to cower in retreat; it’s time to charge!

This was an invitation only event to prevent the media hype and evolutionist disrupters at bay. It was strictly science and not creation science. Twenty peer reviewed papers were presented and are in the process of being published now. All papers in some way shape or form present serious problems and even potential falsifications of the neo-Darwinian theory. The science community will be unaware of these papers until they are fully published in a scientific syposium book as is the usual procedure.

I have been asked not to present substantial information regarding this event until the publication is released. I don't know when, but expect 3-6 months. I have copies of all the abstracts and they are brutal regarding evidence against neo-Darwinian theory. Once released, the science community will for the first time have to deal wilth real contrary evidence. And it will open the doors for future symposiums where the scientific journals don't control the publications and peer review process. You will recognize several of the names of presenters. I will have access to all of these papers in the future, and I will make them available as soon as I can.

Sorry for the vagueness, but you all know the forces that work against such events. It looks like this was a success, and it opens many doors for the truth of an intelligent designer to be a real scientific topic that must be dealt with.

Friday morning June 4, participants were on their way to homes across America and in Europe from a successful conference entitled Biological Information: New Perspectives. They had come to hear leading lights in the Intelligent Design movement deliver 27 scientific presentations on a variety of subtopics under the umbrella theme of information in biology. From all appearances, everyone had a great time of fellowship, encouragement and intellectual stimulation. No protestors or critics detracted from the event—partly because it was not widely advertised, in order to protect the identity of those wanting to take part without jeopardizing their careers. The event was held at Cornell University beginning Monday night May 30 and concluding Thursday June 2.

The symposium centered around three themes: (1) Information theory and biology, (2) information and genetic theory, and (3) theoretical biology. Speakers from disciplines as diverse as thermodynamics, mathematics, linguistics, computer science, genetics, and of course biology presented their experimental findings and theories. Attempts were made to define information in robust ways, to compare and contrast cybernetic and biological information, and to describe levels of information coding in the cell. Computer models of evolution were critiqued, as were attempts to generate information by non-intelligent causes. Not every speaker was a proponent of intelligent design, but all believed it is an idea worth taking seriously.

Speakers and the audience had been instructed to steer clear of religious issues. The focus was on the science, and the content was as rigorous as that of any science symposium. While many well-known spokespersons for intelligent design led the way, there was a notable presence of young scientists with even more enthusiasm for the new design-based approaches to biology than the seniors. Their energy was palpable in breakout sessions and lunchtime conversations. Because of potential harm to careers of some participants, names of all are being withheld from this review.

One thing is clear from this symposium: design scientists have more fun. It was an upbeat event. There was no lack of argumentation and disagreement, but it was all constructive and respectful, with the energetic give-and-take producing light, not heat. The social events were delightful, too. Cornell is a beautiful campus. There's evidence for intelligent design all over the grounds, especially in the university’s gardens and native plant collections. A river runs through the middle of the campus and pours over several cascades.

Interestingly, there was a notable absence of participants from Cornell or the Ithaca area. It appears very likely that many who might have otherwise have attended were afraid of negative professional consequences arising from being associated in any way with this event of its participants..

Take heart, though. It was like that before Soviet communism fell. The last years of the Iron Curtain were fierce; many individuals suffered persecution, and many lived in a state of fear. The Soviet bloc seemed impregnable. Then, perestroika and glasnost came as reality set in that communism wasn’t working. Within just a couple of years, thanks to pressure from Reagan and internal pressure from freedom loving unions, the Berlin wall fell. The world watched in astonishment as the Soviet Union unraveled in a precipitous and momentous collapse, and long-denied freedoms saw the light of a new day. It can happen with Darwinism—unless vigilance gives way to complacency, challenge to comfort, love for truth to fear of criticism. This is no time to cower in retreat; it’s time to charge!

This entry was posted Thursday, June 9, 2011 at 12 p.m. by David F. Coppedge and is filed under the category titled Science in the News section. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Read our Commenting Policy before you post.

I've already mentioned this on PT but I guess it is worth to put here again:

Mrs Johnson reported on her Johnson and Johnson blog that her husband attended the meeting and even included pictures from the Cornell campus:

Quote

After leaving Heather and Andrew, we traveled about 3 1/2 hours north to Ithaca, New York. Howard was fortunate enough to be able to attend a conference on "Biological Information: New Perspectives".

Howard and I were fortunate to share a picnic dinner with this gentleman, Werner Gitt and his daughter, Roma, from Germany. He was one of the speaker's at the meeting Howard went to held on Cornell University's campus. Delightful people.

--------------"[...] the type of information we find in living systems is beyond the creative means of purely material processes [...] Who or what is such an ultimate source of information? [...] from a theistic perspective, such an information source would presumably have to be God."

At the site of <a href="www.bobmarks.org/" target="_blank">Robert Marks II</a>, you can find a short description of the conference, as seen by his wife:

Quote

Cornell University: Next we drove to Cornell University where Bob was part of a conference called Biological Information – New Perspectives. Bob was a coorganizer along with famous ID people like William Dembski (The Design Inference and No Free Lunch), Michael Behe (Darwin's Black Box and The Edge of Evolution), John Sanford (Genetic Entropy & the Mystery of the Genome) and Bruce Gordon (The Nature of Nature). The proceedings of the conference will be published in 2012. Bob thought the conference was a grand success. Bob’s Ph.D. advisor, John Walkup, also came. John and his wife Pat are full time with Campus Crusade’s professor ministry in the Bay Area focusing on Stanford, Berkeley and San Jose State. Two of Bob’s graduate students, Winston Ewert and George Montañez, were also there so we got a wonderful three generation picture.

You swallow Atheist claims of Evolution, gigayears and other anti-scriptural claims with little to no problems. At this Symposium were presented numerous solid-science papers showing that Materialistic views of information - particularly as these relate to biology - are not even wrong (that would be too kind). How do you respond?"... pursuant to creationist claims". I'm sad to say that people like you are not only ignorant, but you appear destined to remain that way. I have an entire section of my home library containing books from NON-Biblical Creationists, including Atheists.I've spent thousands of dollars collecting those books, magazines, journals, etc.That's because I want to LEARN the other POVs so that I know what I'm talking about.Like I said, your remark was asinine.

As for future updates, you can get them from Panda's Thumb or from Tiggy.You seem to have much more in common with them than you do with me.

Jorge

--------------"[...] the type of information we find in living systems is beyond the creative means of purely material processes [...] Who or what is such an ultimate source of information? [...] from a theistic perspective, such an information source would presumably have to be God."

Honestly, it's hard to imagine* how you people manage to sleep at night with the things you say.

This applies to you, Tiggy, O-Mudd, Terror, R06, and a host of others here at TWeb. It's mind-boggling!!!

This event was held AT Cornell University - period. Choke on it if you must but that is what happened and that was the way it was reported. What you people suggest is ludicrous, lunacy and falling-drunk stooooopid. "DISCLAIMER : The conference will be held at Cornell University but it's not 'really' at Cornell University. This is because even though the facilities are on the campus grounds, belong to Cornell, and the service staff all work for Cornell University, the Big Wigs at Cornell do not agree with anything against Evolution. Therefore, though this conference is at Cornell University, it's "not really" at Cornell University. Did everybody get that?"

*Come to think of it, it isn't that hard to imagine at all. The more that people spend time promoting falsehoods, the easier it becomes for those people to not lose any sleep by any falsehood.Ergo, you people probably sleep like the proverbial baby after a nice bath and warm milk.

Jorge

(emphasis by Jorge)

--------------"[...] the type of information we find in living systems is beyond the creative means of purely material processes [...] Who or what is such an ultimate source of information? [...] from a theistic perspective, such an information source would presumably have to be God."

I see both sides of this issue, but I would put as much or more blame on Cornell than on groups that rent Statler Hall from them. Cornell, as a private university, has no obligation to rent their space to anyone. They try to attract rentals as a source of income. And the Cornell name is a selling point for their rentals. Cornell can't have it both ways; if they want to attract rental groups with the Cornell name, they must expect that these same groups will use the Cornell name to publicize their events.

According to the information sheet about renting Statler Hall, "The Hotel School reserves the right to refuse requests for use of space in Statler Hall that it believes is not in keeping with the mission and goals of the school." If Cornell is embarrassed by this situation, they should change their rental policy or make their approval process tighter.

Cornell's event planning information sheet shows concern about using their name or logo on "merchandise" "(i.e. shirts, hats, pens, etc.)" but specifically says, "Note that this policy does not apply to information printed on paper (i.e. posters, program booklets, etc.)."

I don't think the group did anything wrong in scheduling or publicizing their symposium. On the other hand, in attempting to use Cornell's name in the publication of their proceedings, the may well have violated Cornell's policy statement on Use of Cornell's Name, Logos, Trademarks, and Insignias. These sections of the statement are pertinent:

Quote

Cornell University

Responsibility for use of Cornell’s name and marks in the ordinary course of university business rests with the unit head. Questions regarding such use should be directed to the unit head. Examples of such use:1. Official unit names. For example, “Cornell Institute for Public Affairs.”2. Official event names. For example, “Cornell Conference on Law,” or “Cornell Nutrition Conference,” when approved by the appropriate dean or unit head and operated as a university event....Except as specifically authorized in writing, use of Cornell’s name and marks in advertising and other promotional vehicles is prohibited when such use is likely to be perceived as an endorsement, even if such an endorsement is not the intention of the person or organization seeking to use Cornell’s name or marks....Except those uses included in the “Ordinary Course of University Business” segment of this policy, the use of the name “Cornell University” or “Cornell,” in non-student organization names implying or tending to imply some official connection with the university, is prohibited except with the written permission of the university and under such restrictions as it may impose.

--------------"[...] the type of information we find in living systems is beyond the creative means of purely material processes [...] Who or what is such an ultimate source of information? [...] from a theistic perspective, such an information source would presumably have to be God."

I see both sides of this issue, but I would put as much or more blame on Cornell than on groups that rent Statler Hall from them. Cornell, as a private university, has no obligation to rent their space to anyone. They try to attract rentals as a source of income. And the Cornell name is a selling point for their rentals. Cornell can't have it both ways; if they want to attract rental groups with the Cornell name, they must expect that these same groups will use the Cornell name to publicize their events.

According to the information sheet about renting Statler Hall, "The Hotel School reserves the right to refuse requests for use of space in Statler Hall that it believes is not in keeping with the mission and goals of the school." If Cornell is embarrassed by this situation, they should change their rental policy or make their approval process tighter.

Cornell's event planning information sheet shows concern about using their name or logo on "merchandise" "(i.e. shirts, hats, pens, etc.)" but specifically says, "Note that this policy does not apply to information printed on paper (i.e. posters, program booklets, etc.)."

I don't think the group did anything wrong in scheduling or publicizing their symposium. On the other hand, in attempting to use Cornell's name in the publication of their proceedings, the may well have violated Cornell's policy statement on Use of Cornell's Name, Logos, Trademarks, and Insignias. These sections of the statement are pertinent:

Quote

Cornell University

Responsibility for use of Cornell’s name and marks in the ordinary course of university business rests with the unit head. Questions regarding such use should be directed to the unit head. Examples of such use:1. Official unit names. For example, “Cornell Institute for Public Affairs.”2. Official event names. For example, “Cornell Conference on Law,” or “Cornell Nutrition Conference,” when approved by the appropriate dean or unit head and operated as a university event....Except as specifically authorized in writing, use of Cornell’s name and marks in advertising and other promotional vehicles is prohibited when such use is likely to be perceived as an endorsement, even if such an endorsement is not the intention of the person or organization seeking to use Cornell’s name or marks....Except those uses included in the “Ordinary Course of University Business” segment of this policy, the use of the name “Cornell University” or “Cornell,” in non-student organization names implying or tending to imply some official connection with the university, is prohibited except with the written permission of the university and under such restrictions as it may impose.

This person seems confused. On the one hand, he says "I don't think the group did anything wrong in scheduling or publicizing their symposium," then he quotes Cornell as saying "Except as specifically authorized in writing, use of Cornell’s name and marks in advertising and other promotional vehicles is prohibited when such use is likely to be perceived as an endorsement, even if such an endorsement is not the intention of the person or organization seeking to use Cornell’s name or marks."

It's pretty clear that the intent was to create the impression that Cornell was somehow officially complicit.

--------------Evolution is not about laws but about randomness on happanchance.--Robert Byers, at PT

They woulda got away with it if they hadn't bragged before publication. Premature jubilation.

and if it hadn't been for those meddling kids ...

--------------Joe: Most criticisims of ID stem from ignorance and jealousy.Joe: As for the authors of the books in the Bible, well the OT was authored by Moses and the NT was authored by various people.Byers: The eskimo would not need hairy hair growth as hair, I say, is for keeping people dry. Not warm.

I just discovered that David Dunning of Dunning-Krueger fame works at... Cornell.

Quote

The research, led by David Dunning, a psychologist at Cornell University, shows that incompetent people are inherently unable to judge the competence of other people, or the quality of those people’s ideas. For example, if people lack expertise on tax reform, it is very difficult for them to identify the candidates who are actual experts. They simply lack the mental tools needed to make meaningful judgments.

--------------Ignored by those who can't provide evidence for their claims.

Baylor again, his unrequited love. But how deep can one sink to co-author a book with DO'L. After all who if not Dembski must be aware of her logic and her writings. OTOH, IIRC it was Dembski who hired her for UD.

--------------"[...] the type of information we find in living systems is beyond the creative means of purely material processes [...] Who or what is such an ultimate source of information? [...] from a theistic perspective, such an information source would presumably have to be God."

Quick - I've written a blog post that's going to go up on a Major UK (and international) newspaper's web pages about this and it needs a picture. Can anyone suggest something, e.g. from the AtBC archives, that would be suitable, free to use, and not too offensive? I don't want to get sued.

--------------It is fun to dip into the various threads to watch cluelessness at work in the hands of the confident exponent. - Soapy Sam (so say we all)

Quick - I've written a blog post that's going to go up on a Major UK (and international) newspaper's web pages about this and it needs a picture. Can anyone suggest something, e.g. from the AtBC archives, that would be suitable, free to use, and not too offensive? I don't want to get sued.

A picture of what?

--------------Think not that I am come to send peace on earth: I came not to send peace, but a sword. - Jesus in Matthew 10:34

But those mine enemies, which would not that I should reign over them, bring hither, and slay them before me. -Jesus in Luke 19:27

--------------"[...] the type of information we find in living systems is beyond the creative means of purely material processes [...] Who or what is such an ultimate source of information? [...] from a theistic perspective, such an information source would presumably have to be God."

conducting research at the Biodiversity and Climate Research Centre in Germany

Biodiversity and Climate Research, as if biodiversity weren't enough

--------------"[...] the type of information we find in living systems is beyond the creative means of purely material processes [...] Who or what is such an ultimate source of information? [...] from a theistic perspective, such an information source would presumably have to be God."

They woulda got away with it if they hadn't bragged before publication. Premature jubilation.

I beg to differ: they have kept exceptionally quite about the whole thing, only the (automatically generated?) announcement by Springer derailed their plan.

Look how their modus operandi has changed over the last years: Marks's and Dembski's paper "Conservation of Information in Search - Measuring the Cost of Success" was available as a preprint on Marks's homepage, it was announced a couple of times at UncommonDescent, and after years of struggle it appeared in some unrelated journal.

This disadvantage is obvious: public criticism. And boy, they didn't like it.

Nowadays, they try to sneak in their articles in a kind of peer-reviewed journal first. Then they will ignore any critique which isn't itself in form of a peer-reviewed paper. And no one bothers to do so, their math is generally debunked some levels below, in blogs, wikis, etc.

What does this mean if you find an error in their publications? They don't bother! And if you try to correct them via email, you get an answer (if any!) like

Quote

I have a policy not to engage in correspondence with anyone publically critical of me or my work.

The DI held a closed conference in SoCal in 1996 (collection of essays published as "Mere Creation"). They followed that up with a conference in Austin, Texas early in 1997 where they issued a public call for papers and solicited participation of people they believed would hold views counter to their own. The CFP failed to mention "intelligent design". The essays to that conference were posted online, but never collected and formally published.

IIRC, it was in 2000 that the "Polanyi Center" at Baylor hosted the "Nature of Nature" conference that invited in a bunch of big name philosophers. They didn't bother to mention their grinding ax then, either, and still hold a grudge against Barbara Forrest, who wrote a letter to various participants letting them know what they were getting themselves into. A volume finally got published with essays from that conference, but not solely material presented at the conference (again, IIRC).

In 2002, I was denied permission to attend a closed conference at Biola (the "RAPID" conference).

The IDC advocates seem to shift between including and excluding critics. I don't know that we can identify any trend in this from this latest scam.

The IDC advocates seem to shift between including and excluding critics. I don't know that we can identify any trend in this from this latest scam.

The trend that is evident is the renting of publicly available meeting space at various respected science organizations in order to give their movement a veneer of respectability by basking in the reflected glow of that organization's hard earned reputation.

They did it with their Academic Freedom Day at Sam Noble Museum of Natural History at the University of Oklahoma. They tried to do it with their attempt to show "Darwin's Dilemma" at the California Science Center. And now they did so with Cornell.

Edited by carlsonjok on Mar. 08 2012,05:32

--------------It's natural to be curious about our world, but the scientific method is just one theory about how to best understand it. We live in a democracy, which means we should treat every theory equally. - Steven Colbert, I Am America (and So Can You!)

The IDC advocates seem to shift between including and excluding critics. I don't know that we can identify any trend in this from this latest scam.

The trend that is evident is the renting of publicly available meeting space at various respected science organizations in order to give their movement a veneer of respectability by basking in the reflected glow of that organization's hard earned reputation.

They did it with their Academic Freedom Day at Sam Noble Museum of Natural History at the University of Oklahoma. They tried to do it with their attempt to show "Darwin's Dilemma" at the California Science Center. And now they did so with Cornell.

Well .....really now that just leaves "Scientific American" ....right?

The IDC advocates seem to shift between including and excluding critics. I don't know that we can identify any trend in this from this latest scam.

The trend that is evident is the renting of publicly available meeting space at various respected science organizations in order to give their movement a veneer of respectability by basking in the reflected glow of that organization's hard earned reputation.

They did it with their Academic Freedom Day at Sam Noble Museum of Natural History at the University of Oklahoma. They tried to do it with their attempt to show "Darwin's Dilemma" at the California Science Center. And now they did so with Cornell.

I don't think that one can support a trend in dishonesty, either. I did mention that their 1997 and 2001 conferences-with-critics did not bother to disclose to the critics just what they were getting into.

At least there is a trend to decracy because there was at least a second meeting on which only very little information has been disclosed. What we know is from the videos of Berlinski's daughter Cleire. According to Jeff Shellit's summary at least the following people joined the

--------------"[...] the type of information we find in living systems is beyond the creative means of purely material processes [...] Who or what is such an ultimate source of information? [...] from a theistic perspective, such an information source would presumably have to be God."

And they tried to use the "Kansas Science Standards Hearings" as a way to get equal time with mainstream science in a high profile venue. Real scientists refused to play the game, and so the results (the transcripts were published by the state of Kansas) mainly served to highlight the positions (mostly YEC, and/or deniers of common descent) of the ID advocates who came.

Meanwhile, over at Panda's Thumb, Nick Matzke is in an uproar over the publication of a book called Biological Information: New Perspectives (BI:NP). In his usual blunt style, Matzke is upset because "Springer gets suckered by creationist pseudoscience." For those of you who don't know, Springer is a well-known academic publisher, the kind that puts out books that cost hundreds of dollars that almost no one will ever read. (May I add, if you think he's upset now, wait till he gets a list of the contributing authors. He might go into an apoplectic seizure.) According to Matzke,

Quote

The major publishers have enough problems at the moment ... it seems like the last thing they should be doing is frittering away their credibility even further by uncritically publishing creationist work and giving it a veneer of respectability. The mega-publishers are expensive, are making money off of largely government-funded work provided to them for free, and then the public doesn’t even have access to it. The only thing they have going for them is quality control and credibility – if they give that away to cranks, there is no reason at all to support them.

I'm not interested in discussing the merit of the work published in BI:NP, but I am struck by the interesting parallel between Matzke's and Redfield's complaints. From the information I have, the content of BI:NP has largely to do with natural selection, population genetics, and evolutionary biology. Yet it's being published in an engineering publication called "Intelligent Systems Reference Library." Other titles in the series cover subjects like how to solve math problems with software, robotics for assisting wheelchair navigation, and artificial neural networks. So it's a computer engineering series, not really something that would normally publish on pop genetics and evolutionary biology. I suppose technically, "biological information" falls within the extended periphery of the "Intelligent Systems Reference Library," but the publication of BI:NP leaves me a bit unsettled.

On the one hand, I understand that the authors of this volume probably believe that they cannot get their work published in conventional biology journals, because of their controversial, anti-evolution conclusions. I completely sympathize. I would love to be able to have some of my creationist ideas intelligently read and critiqued by knowledgeable individuals, rather than dismissively scoffed at by "howler monkeys" (you gotta be a real oldtimer to remember that reference). On the other hand, I'm a firm believer in the value of peer review and scientific publication. If a work is rejected, there's probably a reason for the rejection that we should take seriously. Scientific publication isn't just some political game, where friends get published and enemies get punished. It's not an inalienable right either. If we don't respect the process of peer review and publication, then what's the difference between a scientific publication and a propaganda piece? The price tag?

So I'm feeling unsettled, and I'm prepared for all sorts of rants to be directed my way. My email's listed below. Have at it.

Edited by sparc on Mar. 08 2012,13:09

--------------"[...] the type of information we find in living systems is beyond the creative means of purely material processes [...] Who or what is such an ultimate source of information? [...] from a theistic perspective, such an information source would presumably have to be God."

--------------"[...] the type of information we find in living systems is beyond the creative means of purely material processes [...] Who or what is such an ultimate source of information? [...] from a theistic perspective, such an information source would presumably have to be God."

For a start here's what Jeffrey Shallit had to say about Turner back in 2007.

(cross posted at PT)

ETA: based on another source PT already listed him as a contributor to BI:NP

Edited by sparc on Mar. 10 2012,00:34

--------------"[...] the type of information we find in living systems is beyond the creative means of purely material processes [...] Who or what is such an ultimate source of information? [...] from a theistic perspective, such an information source would presumably have to be God."

--------------"[...] the type of information we find in living systems is beyond the creative means of purely material processes [...] Who or what is such an ultimate source of information? [...] from a theistic perspective, such an information source would presumably have to be God."

--------------"[...] the type of information we find in living systems is beyond the creative means of purely material processes [...] Who or what is such an ultimate source of information? [...] from a theistic perspective, such an information source would presumably have to be God."

--------------"[...] the type of information we find in living systems is beyond the creative means of purely material processes [...] Who or what is such an ultimate source of information? [...] from a theistic perspective, such an information source would presumably have to be God."

--------------"[...] the type of information we find in living systems is beyond the creative means of purely material processes [...] Who or what is such an ultimate source of information? [...] from a theistic perspective, such an information source would presumably have to be God."

--------------"But it's disturbing to think someone actually thinks creationism -- having put it's hand on the hot stove every day for the last 400 years -- will get a different result tomorrow." -- midwifetoad

is involved in Judeo-Christian apologetics as a researcher, essayist and lecturer

and is a self-proclaimed

Quote

Worldview and Science Examiner

examines the "Biological Information: New Perspectives" story at examiner.com- From his self-description and this picture it was already obvious that he would blow ID's horn -Nothing new just the usual ID spin.

was also involved in the New Age Movement and was a practitioner of Reiki, Tai Chi Chuan, Chi Kung and the I'Ching.

.

--------------"[...] the type of information we find in living systems is beyond the creative means of purely material processes [...] Who or what is such an ultimate source of information? [...] from a theistic perspective, such an information source would presumably have to be God."

just to push this thread further up again:We are approaching the scheduled publication date for "BI:NP" (March 31, 2012)What do you think will happen?

--------------"[...] the type of information we find in living systems is beyond the creative means of purely material processes [...] Who or what is such an ultimate source of information? [...] from a theistic perspective, such an information source would presumably have to be God."

April 1st just started in the US and at Amazon the book is still in pre-order status. Another site lists it as just published. However, the link there will redirect you to the above mentioned Amazon pages.

--------------"[...] the type of information we find in living systems is beyond the creative means of purely material processes [...] Who or what is such an ultimate source of information? [...] from a theistic perspective, such an information source would presumably have to be God."

--------------"[...] the type of information we find in living systems is beyond the creative means of purely material processes [...] Who or what is such an ultimate source of information? [...] from a theistic perspective, such an information source would presumably have to be God."

Cornell University: Next we drove to Cornell University where Bob was part of a conference called Biological Information – New Perspectives. Bob was a coorganizeralong with famous ID people like William Dembski (The Design Inference and No Free Lunch), Michael Behe (Darwin’s Black Box and The Edge of Evolution), John Sanford (Genetic Entropy & the Mystery of the Genome) and Bruce Gordon (The Nature of Nature). The proceedings of the conference will be published in 2012. Bob thought the conference was a grand success. Bob’s Ph.D. advisor, John Walkup, also came.John and his wife Pat are full time with Campus Crusade’s professor ministry in the Bay Area focusing on Stanford, Berkeley and San Jose State. Two of Bob’s graduate students, Winston Ewert and George Montañez, were also there so we got a wonderful three generation picture.

On page 3 of the pdf you will find that picture of Marks, Walkup, Ewert and Montañez at the conference in front of some poster.She also mentions the other not as secret ID conference (Berlinski's daughter reported on it) held in Italy 2011

Quote

Winston Ewert went to Italy with Bob. (I wish I could have gone, but I wanted to see Tristan more that Italy.) In Italy, Bob met Greg Chaitin who is a founder of algorithmic information theory and Chaitin’s number. Boband Winston were both very excited to meet him. David Berlinski (The Devil’s Delusion) and Steve Myer (Signature in the Cell) were also there. After the conference, Bob was interviewed by Berlinski’s daughter for the Ricochet blog. The interview is on YouTube.

Edited by sparc on April 09 2012,01:06

--------------"[...] the type of information we find in living systems is beyond the creative means of purely material processes [...] Who or what is such an ultimate source of information? [...] from a theistic perspective, such an information source would presumably have to be God."

A few years ago I was sucked into a conference run by the Discovery Institute. Some the ID people were sincere and perhaps naive. One had done their PhD at Cambridge, and another at Northwestern, under David Hull, my own mentor. I was a bit annoyed at finding I had been duped, but was pleased to renew friendships with Dan Brooks, Bob Ulanowicz, Bruce Weber and some others, as well as meeting Gunther Wagner and Steve Chaitin, and hearing Stuart Kauffman's confusion once again about spontaneous self-organization (Prigogine style self organizing systems) and movement to a minimal energy point.

Michael Behe was there, and we talked. He is a nice guy, unlike the cads at the Discovery Institute. I had refereed a paper of his responding to criticism in Philosophy of Science. Since the criticism was both wrong and poorly argued, I thought he must have his say (as did the other reviewer, a prominent philosopher of biology whose name I am pledged not to reveal). A warning to those attacking ID: these people are much brighter than your garden variety creationists, and do be careful that you know what you are talking about, or else you guarantee them a refereed publication. In this case the original paper should never have been published.

Behe conveniently missed my talk in which I mentioned recent work showed that rotary "motors" in bacteria resulted from just two mutations, contrary to Behe's argument that they are too complicated for evolution to produce. I also showed how Rosen's non-reducibility argument applied to the resulting network, which Chaiting remarked was the clearest expression of the idea he had seen. So the meeting was worthwhile. But I still resent being duped.

--------------"[...] the type of information we find in living systems is beyond the creative means of purely material processes [...] Who or what is such an ultimate source of information? [...] from a theistic perspective, such an information source would presumably have to be God."

I guess I'm not the only one to sign up for a review cop of BI:NP, so a few of us have probably got an email saying that our online review copy is reserved for us:

Quote

Some time ago you reserved an electronic book review copy of "Biological Information: New Perspectives", 978-3-642-28453-3 for you. We are sorry to inform you that this book is not yet available online, but is being reserved for you. You will be informed by email as soon as online access is available.

Clearly they haven't yet decided to ditch the book: my guess is that no decision has been made yet and this is just administrative.

--------------It is fun to dip into the various threads to watch cluelessness at work in the hands of the confident exponent. - Soapy Sam (so say we all)

I wonder if Springer doesn't have access to Google. It seems quite likely that most of the volume's content has been published before. Thus, critical in depth reviews that are likely to cover most of each of its chapters are already available on the web. E.g., since the announcement of BI:NP Tom English pointed out the fallacy at the core of Dembski's and Marks' active information and Bob Lloyd shredded Sewell's second law musings. OTOH, Springer is currently experiencing what happens if they don't fulfill the demands of the DI and they may be afraid of additional censorship allegations however unsubstantiated they may be.

--------------"[...] the type of information we find in living systems is beyond the creative means of purely material processes [...] Who or what is such an ultimate source of information? [...] from a theistic perspective, such an information source would presumably have to be God."

Today (here in Germany we have August 28 already) it is 150 days that BI:NP's scheduled publishing date passed.

--------------"[...] the type of information we find in living systems is beyond the creative means of purely material processes [...] Who or what is such an ultimate source of information? [...] from a theistic perspective, such an information source would presumably have to be God."

Limiting Google searches for „Biological Information: New Perspectives“ to one week usually leaves us with links to a single web site, TrueFreethinker, which is one of the most bizarre pages I have encountered. This week self-described Agentinean-American Messianic Jew Mariano Grinbank who was mentioned earlier in this thread posted about the devil and rock music here and here.Another highlight.

--------------"[...] the type of information we find in living systems is beyond the creative means of purely material processes [...] Who or what is such an ultimate source of information? [...] from a theistic perspective, such an information source would presumably have to be God."

And later, he repeats this misinformation. By the way, although ID friends were present,

Quote

... I don't recall that Intelligent Design was ever mentioned in the talks ...

Then he whines about the Elsevier's Applied Mathematics Letters affair (mean David vun Kannon! waaah!) and the Springer affair.

Next: Nasty Bob Lloyd attacked him in the Mathematical Intelligencer in March 2012, and Sewell's letter to the editor was rejected - unfair!

Then, he boringly reads out that letter as published in EN&V.

Last complaint: American Journal of Physics rejected his paper, too; it's a conspiracy, surely?

That's the content of 15 minutes of whining, comments are disabled, of course, as they are on UD where he announced the video.

Thanks for the link and the summary. I don't have the nerve to listen to the whole thing.

--------------"[...] the type of information we find in living systems is beyond the creative means of purely material processes [...] Who or what is such an ultimate source of information? [...] from a theistic perspective, such an information source would presumably have to be God."

in preparation• Biological Information: New Perspectives (co-edited with Robert J. Marks II, John Sanford, Michael Behe, and Bruce Gordon). Under contract with Springer Verlag.

edited to correct link to the third image

Edited by sparc on Dec. 05 2012,22:39

--------------"[...] the type of information we find in living systems is beyond the creative means of purely material processes [...] Who or what is such an ultimate source of information? [...] from a theistic perspective, such an information source would presumably have to be God."

Springer seems to have dismissed BI:NP for quite some time already:According to Lehmanns BI:NP was planned as #38 of the Springer series Intelligent Systems Reference Library which is now occupied by the Handbook of Optimization. According to Amazon the later has already been published on August 19, 2012.

--------------"[...] the type of information we find in living systems is beyond the creative means of purely material processes [...] Who or what is such an ultimate source of information? [...] from a theistic perspective, such an information source would presumably have to be God."

It was NOT "fraudulently misrepresented", you lying piece of recycled trash. Every title had been submitted to Springer months BEFORE the Symposium. This included authors, abstracts ... etc. Springer approved all materials submitted to them prior to the event and agreed to publish.

What happened was something entirely different than your lying reporting. It is essentially another example of intellectual censorship based on religious ideology, not on science... another example of EXPELLED.

I certainly am not expecting for you - sick carcass that you are - to comprehend nor accept any of this.

Jorge

--------------"[...] the type of information we find in living systems is beyond the creative means of purely material processes [...] Who or what is such an ultimate source of information? [...] from a theistic perspective, such an information source would presumably have to be God."

Granville Sewell's recent whining about the Biological Information: New Perspectives desaster can be read as if he already knew then that Springer abonded the publication of the proceedings:

Quote

Since AML still refused to publish my accepted article I went ahead and presented it at the May 2011 Cornell symposium as originally planned and submitted a revised version for inclusion in the proceedings. Nearly a year later in March 2012 the proceedings had been peer reviewed and type set and the book was ready to be printed in accordance with the signed publication agreement with Springer were like. But once again a[???] Darwinist discovered that Springer was about to publish the proceedings and pressured the publisher into delaying and re-considering publication. According to this article these critics admitted not knowing anything about the contents of the proceedings they just noticed that the editors were known intelligent design supporters and based on this alone brought pressure on Springer to withdraw the book. In fact, although the editors and most of the participants were ID-friendly I don’t recall that intelligent design was ever mentioned in the talks though most were critical of Darwinism’s ability to explain the development of biological information. Although this time the protests were not directed specifically against my writing, the protesters didn’t know what was in the book, remember, for a second time my article had been peer reviewed and accepted and close to publication when people who had no reason to be involved in the editorial process succeeded, at least temporarily, in suppressing it. As of today seven later the Amazon.com page for these proceedings still says “sign up to be notified when this item becomes available”. Here is the Amazon.com description of the conference:

Quote

In the spring of 2011, a diverse group of scientists gathered at Cornell University to discuss their research into the nature and origin of biological information. […]Several clear themes emerged from these research papers: 1) Information is indispensable to our understanding of what life is. 2) Biological information is more than the material structures that embody it. 3) Conventional chemical and evolutionary mechanisms seem insufficient to fully explain the labyrinth of information that is life.

There you are, you know more about the proceedings than those who demanded it the publisher withdraw the book in March.

(all emphasis mine, links added)

Edited by sparc on Dec. 07 2012,01:51

--------------"[...] the type of information we find in living systems is beyond the creative means of purely material processes [...] Who or what is such an ultimate source of information? [...] from a theistic perspective, such an information source would presumably have to be God."

It was NOT "fraudulently misrepresented", you lying piece of recycled trash. Every title had been submitted to Springer months BEFORE the Symposium. This included authors, abstracts ... etc. Springer approved all materials submitted to them prior to the event and agreed to publish.

What happened was something entirely different than your lying reporting. It is essentially another example of intellectual censorship based on religious ideology, not on science... another example of EXPELLED.

I certainly am not expecting for you - sick carcass that you are - to comprehend nor accept any of this.

Jorge

I haven't looked at TWeb for some time, but IIRC, Jorge is permanently irate.

It was NOT "fraudulently misrepresented", you lying piece of recycled trash. Every title had been submitted to Springer months BEFORE the Symposium. This included authors, abstracts ... etc. Springer approved all materials submitted to them prior to the event and agreed to publish.

What happened was something entirely different than your lying reporting. It is essentially another example of intellectual censorship based on religious ideology, not on science... another example of EXPELLED.

I certainly am not expecting for you - sick carcass that you are - to comprehend nor accept any of this.

Jorge

I haven't looked at TWeb for some time, but IIRC, Jorge is permanently irate.

It's his ground state.

those are the best kinds of tard. permarage

--------------You're obviously illiterate as hell. Peach, bro.-FtK

Finding something hard to believe based on the evidence, is science.-JoeG

--------------"[...] the type of information we find in living systems is beyond the creative means of purely material processes [...] Who or what is such an ultimate source of information? [...] from a theistic perspective, such an information source would presumably have to be God."

sparc, thanks for the updates. It appears that Springer isn't going to publish BI:NP. The IDiots are probably looking for another publisher, and I can't help but wonder if they're considering or planning a lawsuit against Springer. Even if they have no chance of winning such a suit they might push it anyway just to get as much 'Expelled' publicity as they can milk from it.

--------------Think not that I am come to send peace on earth: I came not to send peace, but a sword. - Jesus in Matthew 10:34

But those mine enemies, which would not that I should reign over them, bring hither, and slay them before me. -Jesus in Luke 19:27

Wesley Brewer has removed the four articles planned to be part of the BI:NP proceedings from his webpage. According to Google cache they were still present on November 19, 2012:

--------------"[...] the type of information we find in living systems is beyond the creative means of purely material processes [...] Who or what is such an ultimate source of information? [...] from a theistic perspective, such an information source would presumably have to be God."

Even if they have no chance of winning such a suit they might push it anyway just to get as much 'Expelled' publicity as they can milk from it.

If only the movie had been called "Expressed" there'd have been a pun in there somewhere.

Hardly worth it.

--------------"But it's disturbing to think someone actually thinks creationism -- having put it's hand on the hot stove every day for the last 400 years -- will get a different result tomorrow." -- midwifetoad

I don't see the point in writing a book like this other than to say "we have a book coming out soon" and then forget about it.

Who's going to buy a $100-plus book of bullshit essays?

I can't imagine that Marks or Behe want a POS like this on their resume; they get enough from their colleagues as it is. It's not going to further Dr. Dr.'s "career" as an adjunct professor at a bible diploma mill.

Darwin's Dead Idea and the Man Who Helped Kill It contains a modified version of John Barnham's interview with William Dembski first published on his TheBestSchools.org blog.At the time of the interview (it was published on January 12, 2012) Dembski was expecting that the proceedings of the secret meeting of ID-creationists at Cornell University would be published by Springer. Luckily, Biological Information: New Perspectives didn't appear and they thus removed Dembski’s following statement from the current version of the interview:

Quote

For instance, I have a very substantial anthology coming out with a major academic publisher, but I’m not at liberty to say where until it actually comes out, because Darwinists have the disturbing habit of trying to get publication agreements for ID-friendly literature revoked.

I hope he knows that we found the first evidence for Biological Information: New Perspectives in his CV on his own designinference.com pages.

(edited to correct tags)

Edited by sparc on Feb. 10 2013,23:23

--------------"[...] the type of information we find in living systems is beyond the creative means of purely material processes [...] Who or what is such an ultimate source of information? [...] from a theistic perspective, such an information source would presumably have to be God."

Book DescriptionPublication Date: January 4, 2013"Darwin’s Dead Idea and the Man Who Helped Kill It" makes for highly engaging reading. Witness the fascinating journey of a smart, inquisitive adolescent rejecting his school’s ask-no-questions religious indoctrination into a mathematician, philosopher, and scientist of the highest order, one who today is powerfully and persuasively challenging academia’s reigning answer to the questions that haunt us all: Where did we come from? Why is there something rather than nothing? A leading spokesman for the scientific theory that is shattering materialist assumptions about reality and the origin of life, Dr. William Dembski responds to probing questions from James Barham, general editor of TheBestSchools.org. That interview forms the core of DDI. Dembski’s forthright and humbly restrained responses reveal the courage, perseverance, and original thinking that have made him a lightning rod in the scientific community. The heated controversy surrounding intelligent design theory dramatically confirms Machiavelli’s observation that there is nothing more difficult to carry out nor more doubtful of success, nor more dangerous to handle, than to initiate a new order of things. DDI introduces readers to one of the stellar lights of the new order of things now emerging on the horizon.

And really, like he's anything in the scientific community. Not even much of anything in the kook community, the only one that cares about him at all, aside from those of us who apparently enjoy laughing at old jokes.

Somehow I keep expecting slightly more honesty from these buffoons, mainly because the lies haven't done much for them. But lying seems to be all that they know to do.

I guess we're not at rock bottom! And here I thought being an adjunct "professor" at a North Carolina correspondence Bible college was rock bottom!

Just think, when collecting unemployment is a step above what you're currently doing is not rock bottom, that's a rocky bottom.

So, Dembski is reduced to charging $5 for a Kindle version of a year-old blog posting freely available, still, on the Internet. Srsly, Dembski, this is "leading edge" stuff? And edited by the folks who brought you Of Pandas and People, how nice!

For five bucks, Dembski, you should at least create an ID app. Call it:

Book DescriptionPublication Date: January 4, 2013"Darwin’s Dead Idea and the Man Who Helped Kill It" makes for highly engaging reading. Witness the fascinating journey of a smart, inquisitive adolescent rejecting his school’s ask-no-questions religious indoctrination into a mathematician, philosopher, and scientist of the highest order, one who today is powerfully and persuasively challenging academia’s reigning answer to the questions that haunt us all: Where did we come from? Why is there something rather than nothing? A leading spokesman for the scientific theory that is shattering materialist assumptions about reality and the origin of life, Dr. William Dembski responds to probing questions from James Barham, general editor of TheBestSchools.org. That interview forms the core of DDI. Dembski’s forthright and humbly restrained responses reveal the courage, perseverance, and original thinking that have made him a lightning rod in the scientific community. The heated controversy surrounding intelligent design theory dramatically confirms Machiavelli’s observation that there is nothing more difficult to carry out nor more doubtful of success, nor more dangerous to handle, than to initiate a new order of things. DDI introduces readers to one of the stellar lights of the new order of things now emerging on the horizon.

Wonderfully 'humbly restrained' of them, ain't it?

50 bucks says he wrote it

ETA It's monopoly money, bitches, I don't actually GAF :D

Edited by Erasmus, FCD on Feb. 11 2013,00:35

--------------You're obviously illiterate as hell. Peach, bro.-FtK

Finding something hard to believe based on the evidence, is science.-JoeG

Witness the fascinating journey of a smart, inquisitive adolescent rejecting his school’s ask-no-questions religious indoctrination into a mathematician, philosopher, and scientist of the highest order, one who today is powerfully and persuasively challenging academia’s reigning answer to the questions that haunt us all: Where did we come from? Why is there something rather than nothing?

That's an O'Leary sentence, or I'm a duck.

--------------Math is just a language of reality. Its a waste of time to know it. - Robert Byers

There isn't any probability that the letter d is in the word "mathematics"... Â The correct answer would be "not even 0" - JoeG

Searching for BI:NP doesn't result in much news but I found a nice (if true) story about J. Sandford in an still ongoing discussion:

Quote

There is also a beautiful story about John Sanford, I have a friend who was a post doc at Cornell and on one of the few occasions Sanford went there, he was met with a queue of Bioscience students, who all wanted him to sign a book. I guess he thought, one of his books. No, they all had books such Barney the Dinosaur and the Junior Dinosaur picture book. After about 2 minutes he went bright red (as I imagine longloadr does!) and ran from the campus in tears, so upset he could not drive his own car, and had to be driven home by campus security.

ETA: Today's the first anniversary of this thread.

Edited by sparc on Mar. 10 2013,10:24

--------------"[...] the type of information we find in living systems is beyond the creative means of purely material processes [...] Who or what is such an ultimate source of information? [...] from a theistic perspective, such an information source would presumably have to be God."

One day before the first aniversary of the publication of BI:NP that never happend Granville Sewell anounced at UD that he has published yet another updated version of the bitter video in which he complains about the fact that he cannot publish his views on the SLoT again.In the meantime he tried to get his paper published it in the American Journal of Physics and received the answer he diserved (one wonders what he actually expected) although IMHO the reply was still much to kind:

Quote

Dear Dr. Sewell,We have reviewed your submission „Poker Entrpoy and the Theory of Compensation” (our manuscript 24445) and determined that it is not appropriate for publication in the American Journal of Physics. Please refer to the “Information for Contributors” and the “Statement of Editorial Policy” at the AJP homepage (http://www.kzoo.edu/ajp/).

We do not see any educational value in your manuscript. Because it is well established in the physics community that there is no conflict between the second law of thermodynamics and evolution, we can consider manuscripts which help students understand why. However, papers that promote views that are contrary to accepted understandings in physics should be sent to research journals not to AJP.

Therefore, I regret to inform you that we will not pursue the publication of your manuscript.

ETA: I posted this here because in the original video Sewell complained that Springer didn't publish BI:NP. I will leave a copy at the uncommonlydense thread-

Edited by sparc on Mar. 30 2013,16:48

--------------"[...] the type of information we find in living systems is beyond the creative means of purely material processes [...] Who or what is such an ultimate source of information? [...] from a theistic perspective, such an information source would presumably have to be God."

--------------"[...] the type of information we find in living systems is beyond the creative means of purely material processes [...] Who or what is such an ultimate source of information? [...] from a theistic perspective, such an information source would presumably have to be God."

--------------"[...] the type of information we find in living systems is beyond the creative means of purely material processes [...] Who or what is such an ultimate source of information? [...] from a theistic perspective, such an information source would presumably have to be God."

--------------"[...] the type of information we find in living systems is beyond the creative means of purely material processes [...] Who or what is such an ultimate source of information? [...] from a theistic perspective, such an information source would presumably have to be God."

I'm a bit torn on this: I don't like the idea of censorship, so I'd rather this was published somewhere, but I think it's wrong for a reputable press to publish this as science, unless it's been through a thorough peer review. I hadn't heard of the press before, so I don't know how reputable they want to be. I guess we'll find out.

BTW, I've downloaded the book (from the publishers, it's free folks) and can send it to anyone who wants 20Mb of nighttime reading. Personally, I'm sticking to The Complete Sherlock Holmes for the moment.

ETA: I also tweeted Cornell, to ask if they were aware the book was being advertised as from a symposium at Cornell.

Edited by Bob O'H on June 06 2013,02:30

--------------It is fun to dip into the various threads to watch cluelessness at work in the hands of the confident exponent. - Soapy Sam (so say we all)

--------------"[...] the type of information we find in living systems is beyond the creative means of purely material processes [...] Who or what is such an ultimate source of information? [...] from a theistic perspective, such an information source would presumably have to be God."

Have downloaded all 20-something PDFs. According to the colophon, the publisher, World Scientific, is a Singapore-based publisher with offices in the US (Hackensack, NJ) and UK (London, England). It would be interesting to know whether anyone at World Scientific is aware of the track records of the various editors/contributors.

It's usually the other way around: World Scientific has to convince you to write a book. Every time I give a talk at a visible conference, they send me their CD with Nobel lectures and prod me to write a review. Their requests promptly end up in trash.

Have downloaded all 20-something PDFs. According to the colophon, the publisher, World Scientific, is a Singapore-based publisher with offices in the US (Hackensack, NJ) and UK (London, England). It would be interesting to know whether anyone at World Scientific is aware of the track records of the various editors/contributors.

The book is credited to five editors…(snip)

Remember how MAD magazine used to list their contributing artists and writers? :-)

eta artists not editors.

--------------"But it's disturbing to think someone actually thinks creationism -- having put it's hand on the hot stove every day for the last 400 years -- will get a different result tomorrow." -- midwifetoad

Original scientificresearch was presented and discussed at this symposium, which was then writtenup, and constitute most of the twenty-four peer-edited papers in this volume.These papers are presented in four sections: Information Theory and Biology,Biological Information and Genetic Theory, Theoretical Molecular Biology, andSelf-Organizational Complexity Theory.

"Peer-Edited". That's just like Peer-Reviewed, yes?

--------------Joe: Most criticisims of ID stem from ignorance and jealousy.Joe: As for the authors of the books in the Bible, well the OT was authored by Moses and the NT was authored by various people.Byers: The eskimo would not need hairy hair growth as hair, I say, is for keeping people dry. Not warm.

Original scientificresearch was presented and discussed at this symposium, which was then writtenup, and constitute most of the twenty-four peer-edited papers in this volume.These papers are presented in four sections: Information Theory and Biology,Biological Information and Genetic Theory, Theoretical Molecular Biology, andSelf-Organizational Complexity Theory.

"Peer-Edited". That's just like Peer-Reviewed, yes?

Yep and the flu is "just like" HIV. I mean, they're both viruses right?

And I see Macintosh on this list. How awesome. I trashed one of his papers that was published in the Journal of Design (industrial design that is).

--------------Ignored by those who can't provide evidence for their claims.

Information of two disjoint events should be additive. That is, if the word “stuttering” conveys information I1 and “professor” conveys information I2, then “stuttering professor” should convey information I1 + I2.

To me disjoint events are ones that cannot both happen, so there would be no such thing as a "stuttering professor". In engineering, is "disjoint" often used to mean "independent"?

--------------It is fun to dip into the various threads to watch cluelessness at work in the hands of the confident exponent. - Soapy Sam (so say we all)

Information of two disjoint events should be additive. That is, if the word “stuttering” conveys information I1 and “professor” conveys information I2, then “stuttering professor” should convey information I1 + I2.

To me disjoint events are ones that cannot both happen, so there would be no such thing as a "stuttering professor". In engineering, is "disjoint" often used to mean "independent"?

A disjointed idea is one that lacks logical continuity or contains irreconcilable contradictions. A non sequitur is a form of disjointed construction.

--------------Evolution is not about laws but about randomness on happanchance.--Robert Byers, at PT

--------------"[...] the type of information we find in living systems is beyond the creative means of purely material processes [...] Who or what is such an ultimate source of information? [...] from a theistic perspective, such an information source would presumably have to be God."

It's usually the other way around: World Scientific has to convince you to write a book. Every time I give a talk at a visible conference, they send me their CD with Nobel lectures and prod me to write a review. Their requests promptly end up in trash.

No, it's a real publisher. It's just that the journals it puts out are not exactly coveted by scientists, at least in my field. They are at the bottom of the pecking order. Some articles are OK, most are crap.

If one considers what the IDiots would have made out of Biological Information: New Perspectives back in 2005 one can only conclude that UD and the whole ID business is dead. Judging from the comments over there the troops went back to pure creationism which is understandable: Why choose a tasteless surrogat meal if you can have the real Christian beef.

edited for spelling

Edited by sparc on June 08 2013,04:38

--------------"[...] the type of information we find in living systems is beyond the creative means of purely material processes [...] Who or what is such an ultimate source of information? [...] from a theistic perspective, such an information source would presumably have to be God."

Tiggy has opened a new Biological Information: New Perspectives thread at TheologyWeb

Quote

Clucky and the Tooters “Creation Science” available online!Last year about this time the Discovery Institute began crowing about their science-shaking Cornell Symposium in Biological Information and its coming publication by prestigious science publishing house Springer. The Disco Tooter crowd included the usual Creationist IDiot suspects – Behe, Dempski, Marks, Sanford, Wells, Gitt – as well as our own Clucky Fraudnandez.

Only problems were, 1) the symposium had nothing to Cornell except that’s where the Tooters rented some space, and 2) Springer had been misled into thinking this was a conference on Information Theory, a legitimate mathematical topic.

Springer soon found out the truth and canceled the publication while Cornell didn’t take too kindly to having its name associated with such pseudo-scientific claptrap and threatened heavy duty legal action. Bottom line is the Tooters took all their “Cornell” name-dropping offline beat a hasty retreat.

It took some time but after plinythedumber asked

Quote

Where is Jorge? (Not that I care much).

Clucky Fraudnandez couldn't hold back any longer and provided his views for why Springer didn't publish the book:

Quote

As for the two papers that I co-authored, plus the many others that were part of the symposium, I challenge anyone to point out how they could be called "Creationist" or "Religious". They were pure science and WSPCagreed. Springer merely folded in the face of financial considerations, said financial considerations brought about by those that would have EXPELLED Springer. As I once wrote, EXPELLED is both a threat and occurs at many levels.

(emphasis mine)

Edited by sparc on June 10 2013,14:08

--------------"[...] the type of information we find in living systems is beyond the creative means of purely material processes [...] Who or what is such an ultimate source of information? [...] from a theistic perspective, such an information source would presumably have to be God."

Pardon me if I don't know who Clucky Fraudnandez is. Doesn't come up with a lot of google hits.

That would be Jorge Fernandez, a rather clueless and obnoxious YEC who posts regularly at TheologyWeb and who co-authored some of the BI:NP papers. Think Joe Gallien but without the obscenities.

He has such a reputation for chickening out and running from all attempts to get him to back up his YEC bluster the regulars often refer to him as "Clucky".

--------------"Science is what got us to the humble place weâ€™re at, and what hard-won progress we might realize comes from science, with ID completely flaccid, religious apologetics bitching from the sidelines." - Eigenstate at UD

I had the chance to read the online version of the chapter "Biological Information — What is It?" by Werner Gitt, Robert Compton and Jorge Fernandez. It seems to be a short version of their book "Without Excuse" which is also availble at Amazon.com. They refer to their book 17 times while the other 13 reference together are mentioned 18 times. Unfortunately, "in Biological Information — What is It?" the authors kept quiet about the main conclusion they draw in their book namely (cited from the Amazon blurb of "Without Excuse"):

Quote

"With his co-authors, information scientist Dr Werner Gitt provides the most rigorous and useful definition of information thus far. He distinguishes this Universal Information (real information) from things often mistakenly called information, and shows how ultimately all biological information comes from God."

--------------"[...] the type of information we find in living systems is beyond the creative means of purely material processes [...] Who or what is such an ultimate source of information? [...] from a theistic perspective, such an information source would presumably have to be God."

Looking forward to the series of reviews on the content of Biological Information: New Perspectives Tom English announced on his DiEBlog.

--------------"[...] the type of information we find in living systems is beyond the creative means of purely material processes [...] Who or what is such an ultimate source of information? [...] from a theistic perspective, such an information source would presumably have to be God."

I had the chance to read the online version of the chapter "Biological Information — What is It?" by Werner Gitt, Robert Compton and Jorge Fernandez. It seems to be a short version of their book "Without Excuse" which is also availble at Amazon.com. They refer to their book 17 times while the other 13 reference together are mentioned 18 times. Unfortunately, "in Biological Information — What is It?" the authors kept quiet about the main conclusion they draw in their book namely (cited from the Amazon blurb of "Without Excuse"):

Quote

"With his co-authors, information scientist Dr Werner Gitt provides the most rigorous and useful definition of information thus far. He distinguishes this Universal Information (real information) from things often mistakenly called information, and shows how ultimately all biological information comes from God."

Barry,Please don’t refer to the Cornell proceedings as an “ID-oriented” book. I was at the conference, and while a majority (but certainly not all) of the presenters were ID proponents, I don’t recall that ID was ever mentioned by any of the talks.

--------------"[...] the type of information we find in living systems is beyond the creative means of purely material processes [...] Who or what is such an ultimate source of information? [...] from a theistic perspective, such an information source would presumably have to be God."

7Granville SewellJune 30, 2013 at 5:19 pmDiEb,I don’t know who included the ID tag, I didn’t have anything to do with the Library of Congress tags for any of my books, perhaps the publisher (World Scientific) did write this. But it is an inaccurate tag, whoever added it. I guess any paper that criticizes Darwinism, without including an alternative materialistic theory of evolution, is automatically tagged as ID.

What I really enjoy though, is seeing Granville Sewell being pissed off because when I wrote to Springer to ask them if they were serious I choose him as an example of what they were going to publish and pointed out that his article is unlikely to match their usual standards. I wrote:

Quote

E.g., the talk "A second look at the second law of thermodynamics" is likely by Granville Sewell who has published the same story under similar titles at least three times, partially self-plagiarized. The last time the editors of Applied Mathematics Letters retracted the article (Unfortunately, they agreed to pay Sewell's legal fees in the aftermath). You will find some information on this on the Pandasthumb.org and on retractionwatch.com.

--------------"[...] the type of information we find in living systems is beyond the creative means of purely material processes [...] Who or what is such an ultimate source of information? [...] from a theistic perspective, such an information source would presumably have to be God."

98 julianbre July 1, 2013 at 1:43 pmDr. Liddle, you said “As much right as Springer had to offer to publish them, having not read them. And indeed to rescind the offer when alerted as to the nature of the conference.” The book had been peer reviewed by two reviewers at Springer and was ready for publication. You think Springer publishes books, especially ones that cost over $100.00 with out even reading them? Really?

If they hadn't ban me I would ask UDists for the names of these reviewers. I am afraid we will neither learn who they were nor who suggested them. In addition, it would be interesting to know if the same two peers reviewed the book for World Scientific again. Or will World Scientific publish it without being peer reviewed?

Quote

Springer pulled the book after the panda people contacted them and threatened a boycott of their company if they went ahead with the publication of Biological information–New Perspectives.

Does this IDiot really think that Pandasthumb has so much power?

Quote

How is that not censorship since Nick and his buddies had never read the book and had no idea what was in it.

Did he not read the Nick's post? Nick and the commenters concluded from the titles of the different chapters who would be the most likely author and what they would most likely be writing about. Based on experience nothing much new was to be expected and it turned out that we were right. The only news was that they managed to not mention the designer. At least they claim so.

--------------"[...] the type of information we find in living systems is beyond the creative means of purely material processes [...] Who or what is such an ultimate source of information? [...] from a theistic perspective, such an information source would presumably have to be God."

--------------"[...] the type of information we find in living systems is beyond the creative means of purely material processes [...] Who or what is such an ultimate source of information? [...] from a theistic perspective, such an information source would presumably have to be God."

What I really enjoy though, is seeing Granville Sewell being pissed off because when I wrote to Springer to ask them if they were serious I choose him as an example of what they were going to publish and pointed out that his article is unlikely to match their usual standards. I wrote:

Quote

E.g., the talk "A second look at the second law of thermodynamics" is likely by Granville Sewell who has published the same story under similar titles at least three times, partially self-plagiarized. The last time the editors of Applied Mathematics Letters retracted the article (Unfortunately, they agreed to pay Sewell's legal fees in the aftermath). You will find some information on this on the Pandasthumb.org and on retractionwatch.com.

Rather than discuss with Liddle in the comments section of his first post Barry Arrington prefers to act as the loudspeaker in the ceiling and fills UD's front page declaring victory:

--------------"[...] the type of information we find in living systems is beyond the creative means of purely material processes [...] Who or what is such an ultimate source of information? [...] from a theistic perspective, such an information source would presumably have to be God."

And yes, the irony of being accused of being a fascist and a censor, goaded with jeers of "Arbeit macht frei" in the same thread/topic as I am simultaneously accused of NOT censoring a post at TSZ in which OMagain responds to Kairosfocus's likening of Alan Fox to a German Nazi enabler, and which he noted Kairosfocus' anti-homosexuality was also a Nazi agenda, is not lost on me.

Or, at, any rate, renders any irony meter within a few million miles non-functional.

And yes, the irony of being accused of being a fascist and a censor, goaded with jeers of "Arbeit macht frei" in the same thread/topic as I am simultaneously accused of NOT censoring a post at TSZ in which OMagain responds to Kairosfocus's likening of Alan Fox to a German Nazi enabler, and which he noted Kairosfocus' anti-homosexuality was also a Nazi agenda, is not lost on me.

Or, at, any rate, renders any irony meter within a few million miles non-functional.

The quote is part of the mail I wrote to Springer in which I asked them if they were aware of what they are publishing. I don't feel accused and I still think I was right in doing so. They could have easily published the articles at UD if they were feeling being censored. But they kept quiet until they managed to get it published by World Scientific.

--------------"[...] the type of information we find in living systems is beyond the creative means of purely material processes [...] Who or what is such an ultimate source of information? [...] from a theistic perspective, such an information source would presumably have to be God."

What I really enjoy though, is seeing Granville Sewell being pissed off because when I wrote to Springer to ask them if they were serious I choose him as an example of what they were going to publish and pointed out that his article is unlikely to match their usual standards. I wrote:

Quote

E.g., the talk "A second look at the second law of thermodynamics" is likely by Granville Sewell who has published the same story under similar titles at least three times, partially self-plagiarized. The last time the editors of Applied Mathematics Letters retracted the article (Unfortunately, they agreed to pay Sewell's legal fees in the aftermath). You will find some information on this on the Pandasthumb.org and on retractionwatch.com.

--------------"[...] the type of information we find in living systems is beyond the creative means of purely material processes [...] Who or what is such an ultimate source of information? [...] from a theistic perspective, such an information source would presumably have to be God."

At last, we have a discussion about one of the articles at Uncommon Descent: Winston Ewert reacted to some questions which I raised at my blog about William Dembski's, Winston Ewert's and Robert Marks's article "A General Theory of Information Cost Incurred by Successful Search". Any thoughts?

--------------"[...] the type of information we find in living systems is beyond the creative means of purely material processes [...] Who or what is such an ultimate source of information? [...] from a theistic perspective, such an information source would presumably have to be God."

One chapter of Intelligible Design: A Realistic Approach to the Philosophy and History of Science is availble at arxiv.org:

Quote

Fernando Sols: Uncertainty, incompleteness, chance, and design

.He starts by citing Dembski and claims that there is a contoversy:

Quote

In this often unnecessarily bitter controversy, chance plus natural selection on the one hand and intelligent design on the other hand, compete as possible driving mechanisms behind the progress of species.

--------------"[...] the type of information we find in living systems is beyond the creative means of purely material processes [...] Who or what is such an ultimate source of information? [...] from a theistic perspective, such an information source would presumably have to be God."

One chapter of Intelligible Design: A Realistic Approach to the Philosophy and History of Science is availble at arxiv.org:

Quote

Fernando Sols: Uncertainty, incompleteness, chance, and design

.He starts by citing Dembski and claims that there is a contoversy:

Quote

In this often unnecessarily bitter controversy, chance plus natural selection on the one hand and intelligent design on the other hand, compete as possible driving mechanisms behind the progress of species.

I think it makes sense in the way it's framed. He argues that we can't ultimately ascribe chance to any event (which is fine), and thus he allows for a Designer, albeit one that can't be refuted. It's sort-of interesting, but doesn't really help ID, as he argues that its ultimately not scientific, because it can't be refuted: essentially, a Designer can create something that looks random.

--------------It is fun to dip into the various threads to watch cluelessness at work in the hands of the confident exponent. - Soapy Sam (so say we all)

Woodcarver: "I made this. It used to be round."Frank Burns: "It looks like a two-by-four."Woodcarver: "Thank you."

--------------"But it's disturbing to think someone actually thinks creationism -- having put it's hand on the hot stove every day for the last 400 years -- will get a different result tomorrow." -- midwifetoad

Well of course. Human engineers can do that. And, a skilled designer could "design" something to follow some set of constraints even if those constraints are optional (for that designer). But in that case, somebody studying the result might as well make use of those constraints in any endeavors to figure out what comes next.

One chapter of Intelligible Design: A Realistic Approach to the Philosophy and History of Science is availble at arxiv.org:

Quote

Fernando Sols: Uncertainty, incompleteness, chance, and design

.He starts by citing Dembski and claims that there is a contoversy:

Quote

In this often unnecessarily bitter controversy, chance plus natural selection on the one hand and intelligent design on the other hand, compete as possible driving mechanisms behind the progress of species.

I think it makes sense in the way it's framed. He argues that we can't ultimately ascribe chance to any event (which is fine), and thus he allows for a Designer, albeit one that can't be refuted. It's sort-of interesting, but doesn't really help ID, as he argues that its ultimately not scientific, because it can't be refuted: essentially, a Designer can create something that looks random.

Sounds catholic to me.

--------------"[...] the type of information we find in living systems is beyond the creative means of purely material processes [...] Who or what is such an ultimate source of information? [...] from a theistic perspective, such an information source would presumably have to be God."

Well of course. Human engineers can do that. And, a skilled designer could "design" something to follow some set of constraints even if those constraints are optional (for that designer). But in that case, somebody studying the result might as well make use of those constraints in any endeavors to figure out what comes next.

Quote

Frank Burns: "It looks like a two-by-four."

"Good bye, Ferret face." - B.J.

(But don't ask what "B.J." stands for!)

Henry

There was an episode where they actually did say what B. J. stands for. As it happens, B. J. was named after his aunt Bea, and his uncle Jay. I am not making this up…

Impressing. Especially, the willingness to support the ID movement financially. Therefore, I nominate this buyer for IDURC's Casey Luskin Award 2011. BTW, did anybody hear anything about the Intelligent Design Undergraduate Research Center lately?

ETA link

Edited by sparc on Aug. 12 2013,13:50

--------------"[...] the type of information we find in living systems is beyond the creative means of purely material processes [...] Who or what is such an ultimate source of information? [...] from a theistic perspective, such an information source would presumably have to be God."

"This is by far the most rigorous and in-depth re-examination of the sufficiency ofneo-Darwinian theory. Never have so many well-credentialed scientists, representing so many disciplines, united so effectively to look beyondthe standardmutation-selection paradigm." - The Editors

WACO, Texas, Aug. 12, 2013 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- World Scientific Publishing has just released the proceedings of a symposium held in the spring of 2011, where a diverse group of scientists gathered at Cornell University to critically re-examine neo-Darwinian theory. This symposium brought together experts in information theory, computer science, numerical simulation, thermodynamics, evolutionary theory, whole organism biology, developmental biology, molecular biology, genetics, physics, biophysics, mathematics, and linguistics.

This is a milestone book. For over 100 years, it has been very widely believed that the mutation/selection process is sufficient to explain virtually everything within the biological realm. The 29 contributors to this volume bring into serious question this neo-Darwinian paradigm. They use their wide-ranging expertise to carefully examine a series of fundamental theoretical problems that are now emerging.These problems all relate to the exploding field ofbiological information. Biological information is becoming the primary focus of 21stcentury biological research. Within each cell there are information systems surpassing the best human information technologies. These systems create what is essentially a biological internet within each cell. The authors, although holding diverse philosophical perspectives, unanimously agree that the mutation/selection process is not adequate to explain the labyrinth of informational networks that are essential for life.

Several clear themes emerged from the research papers within this volume: 1) Information is indispensable to our understanding of what life is; 2) Biological information is more than the molecular structures that embody it; 3) Conventional chemical and evolutionary mechanisms are insufficient to fully explain the labyrinth of information that is life.

The book, Biological Information – New Perspectives, was edited by R. Marks, M. Behe, W. Dembski, B. Gordon, and J. Sanford. This volume presents 24 technical papers summarizing the research findings of 29 contributing scientists. The 24 technical papers are open access, and can be freely downloaded from http://www.worldscientific.com/worldsc....8#t=toc . Additional information about the book is available at the same site. The book is available from World Scientific Publishing, Amazon.com, and FMSpub.org.

Source: FMS Foundation, sponsor of the proceedings. For more information contact Dr. Robert Marks at Baylor University ([...]).

SOURCE FMS Foundation

Too bad, that announcing the free download pages won't help to sell more books.

Initially I misread the foundations name for FSM. I don't know what FMS stands for but Flying Monster Spaghettis seems unlikely. Since there is nothing but BI:NP on the foundation's pages it seems likely that its sole purpose is to promote BI:NP without linking it to sites where the link to ID-creationism would be instantly obvious. As a Google search for BI:NP limited to the last 24 hours resulted in 10 pages with news articles just copied from FMS's above cited press release this strategy might work.

whois identified Jimmie Pamplin as the site's registrant who is also the page owner of logosresearchassociates.org which has the following statement on its openening page:

Quote

Who are we?

We are a fellowship of scholars and scientists who faithfully hold to the teachings of Jesus Christ and all of his Word, and also faithfully hold to the scientific method and the need for scientific integrity.What is our goal?

As Ambassadors for Christ we seek to encourage others to believe in Jesus, to faithfully and deliberately believe what Jesus taught, and to believe God’s revealed Word – the Bible – which is the power of God to salvation. We use scholarship, logic, and the scientific method to show that the historical claims of the Bible are not only credible, but are superior to evolutionary theory to explain the origin of the world we see. We freely acknowledge our own fallibility, the inherent limits of “historical science”, and the need for “faith” by adherents of any view about ultimate origins. We urge all people to NOT put their faith in us, or any other form of human authority, but ultimately to put their faith in Jesus Christ.How can we help you?

There is a great deal of misinformation, deception, and confusion surrounding the origins debate, which should not surprise us, as this is a key spiritual battleground. We at Logos do not have all the answers, but we can offer you strong, logical, and scientific reasons to embrace Biblical history. A large part of accepting Biblical history is rejecting what is popularly taught as “evolutionary history”. Evolutionary theory can now largely be discredited, and we can show you this to be true. We stand by Christ’s claim when He said “I am the Truth”. Are you seeking the Truth? Then we have information which can help you!What do we do?

As scholars and scientists we delve deeply into the scientific controversies which affect Christian belief and unbelief. We are doing high quality original research that can challenge many academic dogmas of our day – in areas such as cosmology, geology, genetics, and archeology. We are building national and international collaborative research teams. We wish to effectively communicate our findings, and the findings of others, to people like you.What can you do?

Please consider our evidences. Please be encouraged in your Christian faith. Please decide to be more faithful to Christ – by deliberately choosing to believe Him, and follow Him. If you are a scholar or scientist, share our vision, and feel you can contribute to our work – please contact us by

If you wish to contribute financially to this unique ministry, please know we very much need your support. Please see our donations page.

Here's what logos says about Pamplin:

Quote

Jim Pamplin

B.A. (Biology)

Secretary-Treasurer of Logos Research Associates, Senior Ambassador

Active in creation science circles, Jim became acquainted with a number of Bible-believing scientists. When several found themselves displaced from the research they loved, Jim introduced them to Pastor Chuck Smith of Calvary Chapel Costa Mesa. After prayerful consideration and with encouragement from Pastor Chuck and the Calvary Chapel board, the group incorporated as Logos Research Associates. Jim now serves Logos as office administrator, (i.e., paper-shuffler/pencil-pusher/bean-counter).

--------------"[...] the type of information we find in living systems is beyond the creative means of purely material processes [...] Who or what is such an ultimate source of information? [...] from a theistic perspective, such an information source would presumably have to be God."

--------------"[...] the type of information we find in living systems is beyond the creative means of purely material processes [...] Who or what is such an ultimate source of information? [...] from a theistic perspective, such an information source would presumably have to be God."

Just wondering why user RJMarksII felt the need to add himself, Dembski, Behe, Gauger and Axe to wikipedia's article on the Erdös-Bacon number.Maybe to let Biological Information: New Perspectives and other ID papers appear as serious scientific sources for once. Although in a hidden remote place of the internet only. Since the following bit Marks added was later removed Axe and Gauger cannot be found in the current entry anymore:

Quote

Electrical engineer Robert J. Marks II appeared in Ben Stein's movie ''Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed''. Stein appeared with Bacon in ''Planes, Trains and Automobiles'' giving Marks a Bacon number of two. Marks has published with Donald C. Wunch II (D.C. Wunsch II, T.P. Caudell, C.D. Capps, R.J. Marks II and R. A. Falk, "An optoelectronic implementation of the adaptive resonance neural network", IEEE Transactions on Neural Networks, vol.4, no.4, pp.673-684 (1993)) who published with Frank Harary (Harary, Frank; Lim, Meng-Hiot; Agarwal, Amit; Wunsch, Donald C. Algorithms for derivation of structurally stable Hamiltonian signed graphs. Int. J. Comput. Math. 81 (2004), no. 11, 1349—1356) who has coauthored with Erd?s. Marks therefore has an Erd?s number of three and Erd?s–Bacon number of five. Intelligent design proponent William A. Dembski also appeared in Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed|Expelled. He has published with Marks William A. Dembski and Robert J. Marks II "Conservation of Information in Search: Measuring the Cost of Success" IEEE Transactions on Systems, Man and Cybernetics A, Systems & Humans, vol.5, #5, September 2009, pp.1051-1061) and therefore has an Erd?s–Bacon number of six. Biologist Ann K. Gauger has also published with Marks (Winston Ewert, William A. Dembski, Ann K. Gauger, Robert J. Marks II. "Time and Information in Evolution," Biocomplexity, vol 2012, #4, pp.1-7) giving her an Erd?s number of 4. Gauger appeared in the documentary ''Metamorphosis'' ( MetamorphosisTheFilm.com) which also starred Paul Nelson (creationist) Paul Nelson who, like Marks, appeared in the movie Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed Expelled. Gauger's Bacon number is therefore 3 and her Erd?s–Bacon number is 7. Biologist Douglas D. Axe has published with Gauger (Ann K. Gauger and Douglas D. Axe. "The Evolutionary Accessibility of New Enzymes Functions: A Case Study from the Biotin Pathway," Biocomplexity, Volume 2011, #1 pp. 1-17) and appeared in Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed|Expelled also giving him a Erd?s(2)–Bacon(5) number of 7.

--------------"[...] the type of information we find in living systems is beyond the creative means of purely material processes [...] Who or what is such an ultimate source of information? [...] from a theistic perspective, such an information source would presumably have to be God."

EN&V just reproduced the press released by the FMS foundation I've linked to on August 12. Casey insists that the DI was involved in the "Cornell" "conference" or BI:NP

Quote

Discovery Institute did not organize or fund this conference. In fact, until now, we have deliberately said very little about the resulting volume -- even as anti-ID activists were working hard to prevent its publication.

Nothing new except for the fact that he starts preparing Springer's dismissal of the book contract as an act against academic freedom forced by evil materialist and that lawyer Luskin calls this decesion illegal. There is more tard to come:

Quote

The reasons for our temporary silence may or may not be obvious -- I'll say more about it later.

[...]

One final note in this introduction: There has been some speculation that World Scientific is a vanity publishing house. That is false. It's a respected academic and scientific publishing house based in Singapore that publishes many other respectable scientific publications, including over 150 scientific journals, literally thousands of academic books, and many scientific textbooks.

Because the book challenges neo-Darwinism, no doubt World Scientific will be harshly attacked simply for publishing Biological Information: New Perspectives. That is all the more reason the publisher should be commended for supporting the academic freedom of scientists to disseminate research that challenges mainstream Darwinian theory. You see, originally Biological Information: New Perspectives was set to be published by Springer, but Springer illegally violated the book's publication contract by cancelling it late last year under pressure from Darwin lobbyists. Do what you can to support World Scientific for not caving into the censors.

In fact, attacks on academic freedom are a very important part of the story behind the publication of Biological Information: New Perspectives, and it's a story that now deserves to be told truthfully. This I will do in forthcoming articles.

Actually, World Scientific

--------------"[...] the type of information we find in living systems is beyond the creative means of purely material processes [...] Who or what is such an ultimate source of information? [...] from a theistic perspective, such an information source would presumably have to be God."

I have a credit in the PBS NOVA "Judgment Day" documentary. The narrator of that appeared with Kevin Bacon, which if a credit is sufficient, gives me a Bacon number of two. This one could be argued.

I am a co-author with Jeff Shallit of a critique of Dembski's CSI that appeared in Synthese. Shallit co-authored a paper with Erdos, giving me an Erdos number of two. This might be argued on the basis that the paper appears in a philosophy journal rather than a mathematics journal, but it would be bad form for the IDC advocates to so argue since it is one of the few papers that even cites Dembski's CSI at all.

--------------"[...] the type of information we find in living systems is beyond the creative means of purely material processes [...] Who or what is such an ultimate source of information? [...] from a theistic perspective, such an information source would presumably have to be God."

--------------"[...] the type of information we find in living systems is beyond the creative means of purely material processes [...] Who or what is such an ultimate source of information? [...] from a theistic perspective, such an information source would presumably have to be God."

Jorge Ferndez left his version of the BI:NP story at Theology Web.(cross posted on the EN&V thread)

--------------"[...] the type of information we find in living systems is beyond the creative means of purely material processes [...] Who or what is such an ultimate source of information? [...] from a theistic perspective, such an information source would presumably have to be God."

Why did Joel Kontinen omit William Dembski when he listed the BI:NP editors?

Quote

The editors, Robert J. Marks, John C. Sanford, Michael J. Behe and Bruce L. Gordon, are distinguished professors or associate professors at major US universities and the other contributors are also well-credentialed scientists.

--------------"[...] the type of information we find in living systems is beyond the creative means of purely material processes [...] Who or what is such an ultimate source of information? [...] from a theistic perspective, such an information source would presumably have to be God."

Mike Keas, another participant of the Biological Information: New Perspectives meeting. One may wonder though, why a professor of history & philosophy of science would join a conference which is said to have brought together

OTOH, we know that an online preaching animal caretaker and a Canadian wannabe science writer have been there too.

--------------"[...] the type of information we find in living systems is beyond the creative means of purely material processes [...] Who or what is such an ultimate source of information? [...] from a theistic perspective, such an information source would presumably have to be God."

Check out my new book chapter with Dr. John C. Sanford in the volume Biological Information: New Perspectives, published with World Scientific. Click PDF to see the full text.

Then read Casey Luskin’s no-nonsense documentation of how the book was delayed in its publication for nearly two years because a few flamboyant Darwinists weren’t happy about it. Really, folks — these guys have nothing better to do.

(emphasis mine)Surprisingly, he is a biologist.

--------------"[...] the type of information we find in living systems is beyond the creative means of purely material processes [...] Who or what is such an ultimate source of information? [...] from a theistic perspective, such an information source would presumably have to be God."

"This is by far the most rigorous and in-depth re-examination of the sufficiency ofneo-Darwinian theory. Never have so many well-credentialed scientists, representing so many disciplines, united so effectively to look beyondthe standardmutation-selection paradigm." - The Editors

WACO, Texas, Aug. 12, 2013 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- World Scientific Publishing has just released the proceedings of a symposium held in the spring of 2011, where a diverse group of scientists gathered at Cornell University to critically re-examine neo-Darwinian theory. This symposium brought together experts in information theory, computer science, numerical simulation, thermodynamics, evolutionary theory, whole organism biology, developmental biology, molecular biology, genetics, physics, biophysics, mathematics, and linguistics.

This is a milestone book. For over 100 years, it has been very widely believed that the mutation/selection process is sufficient to explain virtually everything within the biological realm. The 29 contributors to this volume bring into serious question this neo-Darwinian paradigm. They use their wide-ranging expertise to carefully examine a series of fundamental theoretical problems that are now emerging.These problems all relate to the exploding field ofbiological information. Biological information is